A Newgirl's Story: Part II
by Angel in the Morning
Summary: Sequel to A Newgirl's Story. Spot and Owl may have gotten through a war with the Bronx but when Spot begins to lose control of his girl newsies to her, will they live happily ever after or will they be torn apart?
1. Chapter 1

A/N: This is a sequel to A Newsgirls Story. It's not necessary to have read that story to read this one. But since I wrote it, I would love if it you read the first one.

Disclaimer: I owns nothing you recognize from the movie.

Winter in New York was the absolute worst time to sell papes. There were never enough layers to bundle up in to keep out the ever pervasive cold. No one really wanted to buy a pape because it would mean stopping and being out in the bitter cold for longer than necessary. Newsies were buying less papes and spending even longer trying to sell them. Then there was the constant howling of the wind whipping between the buildings that drove to distraction. Owl absolutely loathed selling papes in winter.

Snaps was doing even worse than she was. At least customers felt sorry for Owl and would eventually buy a pape from her because she was a girl. When Owl finally sold the last of her papes, she turned to Snaps and sadly realized he still had half of his. The young black man was shivering visibly as he held his papes. "Do you want help?" she asked. As much as the idea of standing out in the cold even longer made her want to cry, she couldn't just leave her friend outside alone.

"No," Snaps said through his chattering teeth. "Go back to the lodging house. Spot'll kill me if I let you stay out here any longer."

Spot, the leader of the Brooklyn newsies and Owl's boyfriend, probably would throw a fit if she stayed outside longer than necessary, but what he didn't know wouldn't hurt him. "So just don't tell him," Owl said as she grabbed part of his papes.

An hour later they had finally sold the last of his papes. Owl grabbed his arm, pulling him closer for warmth. "Let's go." As they trudged back to the lodging house, Owl vowed to herself that she would invest in a pair of good shoes. The shoes she currently owned had been in her possession since she was 15. Four years these shoes had kept her feet warm during the winter. Until now. Owl could barely feel her feet because the multiple holes in her shoes seeped freezing watery snow which quickly soaked her thick socks.

Half-way home, Owl spied a petite girl with flaming red hair flaring carelessly from under a recklessly placed wool cap and smiled. "Sparks! Wait up!" she called, waving her free arm to get her attention.

Her best friend paused and turned with a smile, instantly recognizing Owl's voice. "Hey Owl, Sparks. You partners today?" Spot had a policy that every female newsie had to sell with one of his male newsies for their own protection. While some of the girls loved this policy, Owl personally thought that the girls would do just fine selling by themselves. And if they couldn't handle that, then they probably weren't cut out to be newsies.

Snaps nodded in response to Sparks' question. "I couldn't even sell my papes without her. I hate winter."

Owl slipped her other arm through one of Sparks' so she had one friend on each side. Their combined heat warmed her fingers enough that she could actually feel them when she wiggled them. "I can't wait for Christmas," she said miserably.

A peal of laughter came from Sparks and Owl turned to her, eyebrows raised in bewilderment. "What if Spot dressed up as Santa for Christmas? Can you even imagine?" Owl merely shook her head at her best friend's antics while Snaps laughed along with her.

They conversed amicably until they reached the lodging house. As soon as they pushed open the door, warmth engulfed them. It wasn't that the lodging house had heat, it was the fact that there were so many bodies crammed into the place.

Owl glanced around and quickly found who she was looking for. Spot was in the corner, deep in conversation with Flips, his right hand man and the best of Brooklyn's muscle. Neither one of them looked too happy so Owl decided it would be best to leave them be. She made her way up the stairs and to her bunk to take off her coat and rest a little before returning downstairs. As much as she loved her life in Brooklyn, she would never get used to the constant chatter and excitement that had never been around in the Bronx.

Her light coat was soaked through so she hung it on the bed post of the bunk she shared with Sparks. Exhausted, she fell into her bed with a sigh. She'd promised Sparks that she would join her for a poker game but all she wanted to do was curl up and take a nap. Her mind drifted to the last time Sparks played poker without her. It had ended with her jumping across the table trying to attack a newsie she suspected of cheating. It was her Irish temper. Spot had yelled for hours about the incident.

There was no way that Owl was willing to deal with that again. With a groan, she got up and headed down to where Sparks had already started the game. They were gathered at a table in the corner. Owl pulled up a chair next to Sparks, waiting to be dealt in the game. Sparks flashed her a wicked smile as she showed Owl her hand, a full house. Owl knew she would win, as usual. Sparks was the Racetrack Higgins of Brooklyn.

"So are you going to the poker game tomorrow?" Ice asked.

Owl and Sparks perked up and exchanged a glance; they hadn't heard of a poker game and if there was any poker game within walking distance, Sparks would know about it. "What poker game?" Owl asked casually. She would love to go to a poker game. During the winter, the Brooklyn newsies rarely left the lodging house except to sell papes.

Ice looked at them curiously, aware how rare it was for Sparks not to have heard of a poker game. "The one in Manhattan. It'll be huge. They invited the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens."

The two girls exchanged another look. How had they not heard about that? Owl had a suspicious feeling that someone had made sure that neither of them heard about it. Sparks shrugged, "Yea, I guess we'll be there."

"No, you won't," a steely voice barked from behind them.

Owl recognized her boyfriend's voice and turned around with a frown. Sparks openly glared at him and asked, "What?"

Spot noticed the look Sparks was giving him and narrowed his eyes. After a moment Sparks looked away, acknowledging his leadership. Spot turned back to Owl. "The girls ain't going tomorrow."

"What? Why?" Owl asked incredulously. Spot knew just as well that she did how desperately they needed to get out of the lodging house and have some fun.

He gave her a don't-go-there look as he said, "The decision's been made." With that, he walked away.

Sparks turned back to Owl and hotly exclaimed, "Can you believe that?" Her pale Irish cheeks flushed red with anger. The one thing that Sparks really cared about was poker and the fact that Spot was keeping her from it was not settling well with her.

Kicker, another of Brooklyn's female newsies, came up behind Owl, her face showing equal signs of discontent. "Owl, you can't let him do that. Do you know the last time I talked to someone other than a Brooklyn newsie? I'm going crazy."

One glance around the room showed that nearly every female newsie in the place was looking at her with similar pleading faces. Somehow she had become the spokesperson for the female half of the Brooklyn newsies, something that was slowly becoming a point of contention between Owl and Spot. After a moment, she sighed as she stood up. "Fine, I'll take care of it."

Flips gave her a knowing look. He was well aware of the fact that the one thing about Owl that really bothered Spot was the fact that during the war with the Bronx, Owl had managed to split the Brooklyn newsies and half of them would have easily followed her.

She shrugged at him as she headed up the stairs to the bunkroom. Owl knew that Spot spent the nights up in his room and would be found there. She knocked on the door softly and called, "Spot?" When heard nothing, she opened the door and walked in.

Spot glanced up from what he was doing, smiling widely, and walked over to her. He leaned down and pressed a soft, lingering kiss to her lips sending shivers of pleasure down Owl's spine. After a moment, he pulled away with a smile, knowing exactly what his kisses did to her. "Hey," he said softly. 

Owl couldn't help but smile. When they were alone, Spot would be the sweetest, most considerate man she had ever met. Like now. After a moment of smiling happily at him, she remembered why she had come up to see him. "Spot, I wanna talk about the poker game," she said, hoping that it wouldn't cause more friction between them.

He sighed and shook his head. "The girls ain't going."

"But why?" she asked simply.

"Owl, do you have any idea how many newsies are going to be there? I can't watch you all."

Owl scoffed irritably. Typical Spot. As much as he claimed that he didn't give his girls special treatment, it was apparent to everyone that he did and it drove Owl absolutely crazy. She took a deep breath to control her irritation with Spot. "The girls don't always need to be watched. We can handle ourselves," she said slowly and calmly.

Her comment brought a cocky laugh from Spot. "Remember when you told me you could handle yourself? And then I found you caught in an alley with Ends and I had to save you."

An embarrassed blush crept up her cheeks as she remembered the incident. "I was handling it," she mumbled crankily.

"Sure you were," Spot said arrogantly, his eyes sparkly with confidence.

As the incident replayed in her head, she suddenly remembered that the offending newsie had disappeared soon after and that whenever she questioned Spot about it, he became visibly uncomfortable. "You never told me what happened to him," she said innocently, her sky blue eyes wide on her face.

"To who?" Spot questioned nervously.

Owl smiled and said simply, "Ends."

Spot looked around the room, avoiding eye contact. After a moment, in an attempt to change the subject, he said, "I was wrong. The girls can go; they deserve to get out every once in awhile. I'll just have to keep a close eye on them."

Owl smiled prettily, knowing she won. Spot saw and realizing what Owl did, shook his head with a cocky smirk. "You know, that wasn't fair."

"No, that was fair," she said with an equally cocky smile. "It wouldn't be fair if I did this." Owl pressed her body against him and caressed his face softly with her hand. She leaned up and captured Spot's lips with hers, aware that he wouldn't resist. His arms wrapped around her and pulled her even closer to him.

Spot broke away from their kiss for a moment and his icy grey blue eyes danced happily. "That ain't fair," he said huskily.

Owl shut the door to his room with a smirk. "No, it most definitely is not."


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I still own nothing.

The poker game was being held in an abandoned warehouse in Manhattan just across the Brooklyn Bridge. Newsies had been leaving Brooklyn to arrive at the game for several hours. Sparks had decided to wait for Owl who was forced to wait for Spot to finish up so business with Flips. As a result, the four of them were walking to the game together in an awkward group. The moment they walked through the door, Owl was overwhelmed with the amount of newsies in front of her. The only time she had seen that many newsies was at the rally at Medda's during the strike. Owl turned to Sparks only to find that she had already made a mad dash to the closest poker table.

On her other side, Spot put his arm around her shoulders, making it blatantly obvious to every newsie in the building that she was his property. Owl was torn; part of her was proud that Spot Conlon wanted the world to know they were together while another part chaffed against his misogynist attitude. For the moment, she ignored it as he led her to greet the other leaders.

Victor, the leader of the Bronx newsies and her older brother, smiled widely when he saw Owl. He opened his arms and swept her up in a hug, "Little sis!" She gave him a grateful kiss on the cheek when he set up back down.

Cowboy nodded at her, "Good to see you settling in."

Spot sat down and pulled Owl into his lap possessively as he began to talk shop with Jack and the leader of Queens, a young man by the name of Chance. Owl turned to her brother, "How's Amber?"

He shrugged nonchalantly. "Fine. Don't got many friends but at least my girls ain't plotting to jump her."

She blushed sheepishly. "I tried to talk them out of it but she did hurt a lot of people. You can't blame them for hating her."

Owl was distracted from his response by a commotion that was starting at one of the poker tables. She instantly recognized Sparks' voice among the raising voices and glanced apologetically at Spot, conscious of the fact that if she hadn't made him allow the girls to come, this wouldn't be happening. "I'll handle it," she said as she stood up from his lap.

Spot shook his head warily. "She's my newsie, I got it."

He made his way to the table and Owl followed close behind. As they got closer she recognized another newsie who was involved, Racetrack. He and Sparks were screaming at another newsie who Owl didn't recognize.

"Sparks," Spot barked, his eyes narrowing menacingly. "What are you doing?"

Sparks' eyes bounced back and forth between Owl and Spot. Owl nodded her head in Spot's direction indicated to Sparks that she should answer. "This kid accused Racetrack of stacking the deck," Sparks said angrily.

No one took poker more seriously than those two. Owl resisted the urge to smack Sparks for causing a commotion for that as Spot shook his head. "Owl, take her to another table."

Sparks glanced at Owl who held out her hand. With a scowl she took it and they walked to an empty table and sat. Owl knew that it would take her a moment to calm down and she bit her nail absently as she waited. After a moment, Sparks spoke softly, "You know, since you started dating Spot, you listen to him a lot more than you used to."

Owl's eyebrows arched suspiciously. "What?"

"You used to challenge him all the time," she said with a roll of her eyes.

A laugh floated from Owl's mouth before she could stop it. "Because he made stupid decisions," she joked.

"He still makes stupid decisions."

"Like stopping your fight?"

A slow smile spread across Sparks' face, "Fine, he makes one or two good calls."

Owl laughed, "I'm glad you think so." She knew this was stemming from Sparks' feelings of neglect. She sighed, "I just don't want to fight with him all the time. But I do think some of the things he does is stupid."

"Oh?" she asked curiously. Owl never spoke about her problems with Spot, not since they officially started dating.

"The way he is so overprotective of us girls. He seems to think none of us can take care of ourselves. It drives me crazy."

Sparks shrugged. "I've just never known him not to be like that."

"When I was in the Bronx, none of the girls had selling partners. Did you know I could make almost twice as much selling alone? And with a regular selling spot? Not just selling where today's partner does."

She scoffed. "You know that's never going to happen in Brooklyn."

Owl nodded, "I know."

They were interrupted from further conversation by the arrival of two newsies they had never met. It was instantly apparent that they were brothers. The taller of the two had a rusty red hair nearly shaved down to his skull. He had dancing green eyes and a smirk was playing on his face. The other one was the more attractive of the two. He had a mop of dark brown hair arching sexily in every direction. His eyes were a deep sultry green with long full lashes. He gave Owl a smile that sent shivers of anticipation through her veins.

"What are two beautiful lasses like yourselves doing here?" the taller of the two asked in a thick Irish accent as he sat in the seat next to Sparks.

Owl resisted the urge to look at Sparks, knowing that she would burst into childish girly giggles if she did. Instead she smiled as the shorter man spoke. "Ignore him, he don't know how to talk to girls." He slide into the empty chair next to Owl.

She nodded slowly. She had never seen a more beautiful man in her life. She didn't even think men could be beautiful but this one was. "I kinda got that impression," she said lamely. She heard Sparks snickering next to her and elbowed her. "Who are you?"

The short one spit in his hand and held in out in typical newsie fashion, "Me name's Sean. This here is me brother Patrick."

Owl reciprocated the handshake and introduced herself. After a second nudge Sparks spoke, "I'm Sparks. You all ain't Irish by chance?" she asked with a grin. Owl knew for a fact that Sparks was just dying to meet the Irish man of her dreams.

The two brothers chuckled and Owl was shocked by how attractive Sean looked when he was laughed. Most people looked like complete idiots when laughing. "We have a wee bit o' Irish on me mother's side," Patrick joked with a wink at Sparks. It was obvious to everyone that they were as Irish as they came.

Sparks seemed to melt under his smile and giggled. "I'm Irish," she offered.

Owl rolled her eyes and poked playfully at her friend. "They couldn't tell from your freckles or flaming red hair." Sparks blushed prettily while the two boys chuckled again.

Sean smiled at Owl, "What about you, lass?"

Drawn into his charming emerald green eyes, it took her a moment to realize that he had asked her a question. "Me?" Owl squeaked, earning a sharp jab in the side from Sparks.

He laughed pleasantly, as if he was used to girls falling to pieces around him. With his looks, Owl reasoned, he probably was. "You aren't Irish," he said.

She shook her head. "No. My mother was Hungarian."

"And your father?" he asked with his charming Irish voice. He put his arm against the table and leaned against it and Owl was shocked at how toned and muscled his bicept was. She shook herself mentally. Spot, her boyfriend, had amazing muscles as well, she reminded herself.

"Never knew him," she said, answering his question.

"I'm sorry, dear. That must have been hard for you," he said as he looked deep into her eyes. Owl was drawn once again into his eyes, marveling at how green they were. She had never seen anything like it.

After a moment, Owl realized how crazy she must be, staring at a man she just met. She cleared her throat nervously. "I had my brother."

Sean nodded in understanding. "After me parent's died, me brother was all I had." Owl glanced over and saw that Sparks was deep in conversation with Patrick. Maybe he would turn out to be the man Sparks had been waiting for.

"So you two are newsies?" Owl asked curiously. She assumed that they would be considering where they were but one never knew.

He nodded. "We just joined with Manhattan."

"Oh? Why not Brooklyn? That's where most Irish go." Everyone knew Spot was Irish and Irish newsies generally went with him. Vic was Hungarian and most _ newsies went to the Bronx. It was just how it was and was probably how it always would be.

His eyes lit up, "Is that where you are?" Owl nodded with a smile. "We thought about it but we heard some things about Spot Conlon that changed our minds."

"Did you hear that he hated _ stealing his girl?" a steely cold voice said from behind them.

The blood and color drained from Owl's face as she turned and saw Spot glaring behind them. He refused to look at her, instead focusing all of the hate and malice in his glare on Sean. Owl opened her mouth but didn't know what to say. Sparks saved her by saying, "Spot, this is Sean and Patrick. They're from Manhattan. Sean, Patrick, this is Spot Conlon."

An evil smile crossed his face. "I'm the leader of Brooklyn." He glanced at Owl and the flash of jealousy was so intense that she couldn't help but look down, ashamed. "I'm also the one fucking Owl."

"Spot!" Owl exclaimed as she looked up in horror, her face flaming bright crimson in embarrassment. Hot salty tears sprang to her eyes and it took all of her willpower to keep them from falling down her cheeks. Never in her life had she been so embarrassed. She glanced at Sparks whose mouth had fallen open in shock.

Sean stood and smiled hardly. "I didn't mean to poach your girl. I was just introducing meself. She looked lonely sitting here all alone."

It was a challenge and everyone within hearing distance knew it. Spot's icy glare ran up and down Sean, sizing him up. Owl bit her lip and noticed to her great relief that Flips was standing behind Spot. Hopefully he would be able to calm Spot down. She glanced back at Spot and saw he was gripping his cane so hard his knuckles were turning white. She put her hand on him in an attempt to calm him but he angrily pulled his arm from her grasp. "Owl, go say hi to your brother. He misses you. Sparks, make sure she doesn't get sidetracked on the way there."

As much as Owl wanted to protest, the only time she had ever seen Spot this angry was when Bliss had hurt her. She opened her mouth but one glance at Flips' ashen face convinced her not to. Sparks, terrified, grabbed her hand, "Come on, let's go."

They quickly made their way over to Vic, very well aware of the fact that nearly every newsie in the place was subtly watching the drama unfolding. With all of the eyes on her, Owl was too scared to cry or even open her mouth to say anything to Sparks.

When they reached his table, Vic shook his head, "You really messed up, Mariska."

Owl sighed and wondered just how badly she had messed up and if she would be able to fix it.


End file.
